page_title: Chorlton Poor Law Union
section_title: Early history
hierarchical_section_title: Chorlton Poor Law Union / Early history
caption_attribution_description: Ormond Building, Manchester Metropolitan University
context_page_description: Chorlton Poor Law Union was founded in January 1837 in response to the Poor Law Amendment Act 1834, also known as the New Poor Law. It was overseen by an elected board of 19 guardians representing the 12 parishes in the area it served: Ardwick, Burnage, Chorlton-upon-Medlock, Chorlton with Hardy, Didsbury, Gorton, Hulme, Levenshulme, Mosside, Rusholme, Stretford, and Withington, all in present day south Manchester, England.
context_section_description: The union's first workhouse, the Stretford Road Workhouse, offered accommodation for 300 inmates, with segregated living areas for various categories of paupers, such as children, lunatics, the elderly, and the sick; female inmates were housed in the west of the building and males in the east, separated by a central communal dining hall and chapel. The population of the area served by the Chorlton Poor Law Union had been 46,465 at the time of the 1831 census, but as it rapidly increased during Manchester's industrialisation it became clear that the capacity of the Stretford Road Workhouse was inadequate for the demands placed on it. As the Stretford Road site offered no scope for expansion the guardians decided to commission the construction of a second workhouse, the Withington Workhouse. Opened in 1855, and costing £53,000 to build, the new workhouse was able to accommodate up to 1500 inmates. The site also included a new cemetery to serve the union's area, the Chorlton Union Cemetery, which remained in use until 1920.
  The Offices of the Poor Law Guardians were built in 1881. The building was designed by Mangnall & Littlewood and also included a registry office. Since 1970 it has been used by the polytechnic.
  Emmeline Pankhurst was a member of the Board of Guardians.
caption: The Ormond Building, Cavendish Street
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